HelpFinder Bible - Flipbook - Page 537
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12 “If you listen to these regulations and faithfully obey them, the Lord your God will keep his
covenant of unfailing love with you, as he promised with an oath to your ancestors. 13 He will love
you and bless you, and he will give you many children. He will give fertility to your land and your
animals. When you arrive in the land he swore to
give your ancestors, you will have large harvests
of grain, new wine, and olive oil, and great herds
of cattle, sheep, and goats. 14 You will be blessed
above all the nations of the earth. None of your
men or women will be childless, and all your livestock will bear young. 15 And the Lord will protect
you from all sickness. He will not let you suffer
from the terrible diseases you knew in Egypt, but
he will inflict them on all your enemies!
16 “You must destroy all the nations the Lord
your God hands over to you. Show them no
mercy, and do not worship their gods, or they
will trap you. 17 Perhaps you will think to yourselves, ‘How can we ever conquer these nations
that are so much more powerful than we are?’
18 But don’t be afraid of them! Just remember
what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and to
all the land of Egypt. 19 Remember the great terrors the Lord your God sent against them. You
saw it all with your own eyes! And remember the
miraculous signs and wonders, and the strong
hand and powerful arm with which he brought
you out of Egypt. The Lord your God will use
this same power against all the people you fear.
20 And then the Lord your God will send terror* to
drive out the few survivors still hiding from you!
21 “No, do not be afraid of those nations, for
the Lord your God is among you, and he is a
great and awesome God. 22 The Lord your God
will drive those nations out ahead of you little
by little. You will not clear them away all at once,
otherwise the wild animals would multiply too
quickly for you. 23 But the Lord your God will
hand them over to you. He will throw them into
complete confusion until they are destroyed.
24 He will put their kings in your power, and you
will erase their names from the face of the earth.
No one will be able to stand against you, and you
will destroy them all.
25 “You must burn their idols in fire, and you
must not covet the silver or gold that covers
them. You must not take it or it will become a
trap to you, for it is detestable to the Lord your
God. 26 Do not bring any detestable objects into
your home, for then you will be destroyed, just
like them. You must utterly detest such things,
for they are set apart for destruction.
A Call to Remember and Obey
“Be careful to obey all the commands I am
giving you today. Then you will live and
multiply, and you will enter and occupy the
8
7:20 Often rendered the hornet. The meaning of the Hebrew
is uncertain.
DEUTER ONOM Y 8
land the Lord swore to give your ancestors. 2 Remember how the Lord your God led you through
the wilderness for these forty years, humbling
you and testing you to prove your character, and
to find out whether or not you would obey his
commands. 3 Yes, he humbled you by letting you
go hungry and then feeding you with manna,
a food previously unknown to you and your ancestors. He did it to teach you that people do
not live by bread alone; rather, we live by every
word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
4 For all these forty years your clothes didn’t
wear out, and your feet didn’t blister or swell.
5 Think about it: Just as a parent disciplines a
• Obedience
DE U TE R ON OM Y 8:1
Should we try to obey all of God’s
commandments? Yes, of course, realizing
that we are not perfect and that we may
fail in some. But if we know we will fail,
why try? Because we do not know where
we will fail or even how badly we will
fail. If we don’t try to obey any of God’s
commandments, we will end up obeying
none of them. If we try to obey them, we
will succeed in obeying many of them.
Even though we’re not perfect, we can
persevere in striving to become all God
wants us to be. And if we consistently
work at obeying God’s commandments,
then we will gain the trust of others,
because they know that our goal is to
always do what is true and right.
• Discipline
DE U TE R ON OM Y 8:5
When we discipline our children, we
should always first ask ourselves, “What
am I trying to do? Am I trying to help the
child or vent my anger? Demonstrate
the difference between right and wrong,
or break the child’s spirit so that he
doesn’t bother me so much?” When our
motives are right, our actions will likely
be right too. But wrong motives give birth
to unwholesome actions. Guard your
motives when you are disciplining your
child. Keep in mind how and why the Lord
disciplines—that his aim is always to build
us up and to help us develop to our fullest
potential. And if God is disciplining you,
ask for the wisdom to pay attention and to
respond in a constructive way—the way
you would like your child to respond.